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That last “now” catapulted her to the French doors. She barely stopped before she shot over the balcony’s balustrade.
And standing down there, among the shrubs below, in all his mind-blowing glory, was Aram.
Azure bolts arced from his eyes and a wounded lion’s growl came from his lips. “What are you doing here?”
Her head spun at the brunt of his beauty under Zohayd’s declining sun and the absurdity of his question.
She blinked, as if it would reboot her brain. “What are you doing here? In Zohayd? And standing beneath my window?”
He stuck his fists at his hips. He looked…angry? And agitated. Why? “What does it look like? I’m here to see you.”
She shook her head, confusion deepening. He must have left New York just a few hours after she had. Had he come all the way here to find out why she had? After he’d basically told her to scram? Why not just call? What did it all mean?
Okay. With the upheaval of this past day, her brain was on the fritz. She could no longer attempt to make any sense of it.
She pinched the bridge of her nose. “Well, you saw me. Now go away before all my family comes out and finds you here. With the way you’ve been shouting, they must be on their way.”
He widened his stance, face adamant planes and ruthless slashes. “If you don’t want them to see me, come down.”
“I can’t. If I go down and try to walk through the front door, I’ll have twenty females on my case…and I don’t want the ulcer I’ve acquired in the last hours to rupture.”
“Then climb down.”
That last whisper could have sandpapered the manor’s facade. “Okay, Aram, I know you’re crazy, but even in your insanity you can see that the last foothold is twenty feet above splat level.”
He shrugged. “Fifteen max. I’ll catch you.”
Closing her mouth before it caught one of the birds zooming back to their nests at the approach of sunset, she echoed his pose, fists on hips. “If you want to reenact Shaheen’s stunt with Johara, I have to remind you that she was six at the time.”
That shrug again. “You’re not that much bigger now.”
She coughed a chagrined laugh. “Why, thanks. Just what every grown woman wants to hear.”
He sighed. “I meant the ratio of your size to mine, compared to that of fourteen-year-old Shaheen to six-year-old Johara.” He suddenly snarled again, his eyes blazing. “Stop arguing. I can catch you, easy. You know I’ve been exercising.”
Yeah, she knew. She’d attended many a mind-scrambling session, seen what he looked like with minimal clothing, flexing, bulging, sweating, flooding a mile’s radius with premium, lethal testosterone.
“But even in my worst days, I would have been able to catch you. I always knew I was that big for a reason, but I just never knew what it was. Now I know. It’s so I could catch you.”
Her mouth dropped open again.
What that man kept saying.
What would he say when he was actually in love…?
That thought made her feel like jumping off the balcony—and not so he could catch her.
She inhaled a steadying, sanity-laced breath. “Oh, all right. Just because I know you’ll stand there until I do. Or worse, barge into the house to come up here and have a houseful of your old fans pick your bones. I hope you know I’m doing this to save your gorgeous hide.”
His smile was terse. “Yes, of course. I’m, as always, eternally indebted to you. Now hurry.”
Mumbling under her breath about him being a hulk-sized brat who expected to get his way in everything, she took one last bracing breath and climbed over the balustrade.
As she inched down over the steplike ledges, he kept a running encouragement. “You’re doing fine. Don’t look down. I’m right here.”
Slipping, she clung to the building, wailed, “Shut up, Aram. God, I can’t believe what you can talk me into.”
He just kept going. “Keep your body firm, not tense, okay? Now let go.” When she hesitated, his voice suddenly dropped into the darkest reaches of hypnosis. “Don’t worry, I’ll catch you, ya kanzi.”
